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A New Year, a New Executive Director for the Cape Cod Writers' Center

Late in 2007, after a wide search, the board of directors of the Cape Cod Writers' Center selected Anne Elizabeth Tom as the new Executive Director, starting in January 2008.

Anne Elizabeth, who lives in Sandwich with her husband Steve, grew up in Boston, but remembers the summers her extended family spent on Cape Cod as the happiest of her childhood days. After receiving her Master of Arts in Fine Arts from Tufts University, she lived in Woods Hole and taught in the Falmouth-Out-of-School experimental program, while beginning her career as a writer, cultural educator, and administrator.

For several years she worked as a writer/editor for The MITRE Corporation, near Boston, in the publications department, producing corporate communications, film and video scripts, exhibits, and conferences. But an adventurous spirit drove her to try life on the West Coast. There, Anne Elizabeth met her future husband and a new adventure began, as she took on the challenge of balancing not only her career and family life, but also adapting to his career in international telecommunications, which took them from Los Angeles, to New York, and Washington, DC before she finally realized her dream of moving back to Cape Cod, where she found life here even more satisfying than she had imagined.

For several seasons she produced the Grange Hall Summer Poetry Series, the Cape Cod Winter Poetry Series, and original plays of Cape playwrights. She began to publish her poetry in small literary magazines, including The Aurorean, Poesy, and Ibbetson, and was anthologized in Out of the Blue Writers Unite (2003), Summer Home Review, II (2004), and Bagels with the Bards, II (2007). More recently, she took on an entrepreneurial endeavor, establishing Cape Cod Cultural Tours, which specialized in custom excursions focused on local history, architecture, art, and literary history. She recently sold the business, but says her research on Cape culture resulted in new writing material and introduced her to many Cape Cod writers.

In looking back, Anne Elizabeth says, "I thought life could not get better until I accepted this opportunity. Now I am even happier, being able to contribute to an organization that helped to jump-start my creative writing."

Sheila Whitehouse, president of the board, noted that the selection committee chose Anne Elizabeth for her broad professional and life experience and her commitment to Cape Cod's cultural presence. "Anne Elizabeth's ambition to make the Cape Cod Writers' Center a more nationally and internationally renowned Mecca for writers, resonates with the goals of the board."

FROM THE DESK OF THE EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR:
HOW MANY WRITERS ON CAPE COD?

At the last board of directors' meeting, Herb Greenwald, in considering our membership numbers, noted that the Cape Cod Art Association has 1,000 members, and questioned how many more Cape Cod writers we might be able to reach out to through the CCWC. This started my thinking of the proverbial jar of jellybeans. How many writers are there on this peninsula? Any guesses? Whoever comes closest wins an annual membership.

In speaking with a representative of the Massachusetts Cultural Council about the Patrick administration's creative economy plan and recent results of marketing the cultural resources of Cape Cod, I asked where writers, the Cape Cod Writers Center, and our annual conference might fit in. In terms of sheer quantity, there are three New England states-Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Rhode Island-in the top 10 in the country for the percentage of artists in the workforce. But what role do writers on the Cape play in terms of cultural resources and the Cape Cod cache? Historically, we know about our prolific authors from Joseph Lincoln to Kurt Vonnegut, Stanley Kunitz, and Norman Mailer, and we know instinctively that our creative environment is breeding others of high caliber. Of interest to the Cape Cod Writers Center is where and who these writers are, what organizations they belong to, what writers' conferences they attend, and how we might better serve them through our organization.

As we research these statistics, and embark on a campaign to grow our membership and annual summer conference, I invite your thoughts on how many Cape writers are out there, and how we might let them know we are here for them. Remember, whoever comes closest on the number of Cape Codders identifying themselves as writers wins an annual membership

A NEW YEAR, A NEW LOOK:
OUR REDESIGNED WEBSITE AND MARKETING COMMUNICATIONS

If you visited our website lately, you have seen that we removed some of the older information and have informed readers that we are redesigning the site. We hired a combination of Cape designers, LondonEye Graphics (Sally Harvey) and Insite Media Design (Darlene Billmair) to create an up-to-date look and use of technology to make it easier to navigate the site, to join the CCWC, and to register for our programs.

Our conference registration has been complex, due to a wide range of options, making online registration a challenge, but we are working to streamline the registration form and hope to add interactive conference registration later. Meanwhile, the conference program workshops and faculty will be posted in April, when we have the new website up.

Concurrently, we are redesigning our members' brochure, our newsletter (by the spring edition), and our conference tee shirts and book bags, as well. In fact, you will see an all-new look evolving in all our publications and products as 2008 continues.

A move to a sunny new office upstairs in the same C. H. Newton Builders headquarters in Osterville happened to coincide with all this redesigning, so if you are looking for us, and wondering where we have gone, or where we are headed, you can rest assured it will all be like our new space and our new design-a fresh start, upward, and sunny!

GROWING THE CAPE COD WRITERS' CENTER
SPRING MEMBERSHIP DRIVE

Along with our new look for 2008 comes a drive to reach more writers here on Cape Cod and around the world. We have our first member from China, a poet and diplomat who graduated from The Fletcher School at Tufts University and lived in Washington for two years before returning to Beijing. He hopes to join us this summer at the conference.

Our outreach has also begun to those of you who did not realize that your membership had expired, as well as members who have been out of touch for awhile. We hope to renew old friendships, update addresses, and learn why some let their membership lapse. The membership dues have begun to flow in. Please help us keep up the momentum by checking your membership and by getting the word out that there are exciting changes underway at the CCWC-new partnerships, new member discounts, new opportunities.

WRITERS AND THE CREATIVE ECONOMY

The Cape Cod Chamber has invited the Cape Cod Writers' Center to serve on the new steering committee that will brainstorm on growing the Cape's creative economy.

What is the creative economy and how does the Cape Cod Writers' Center fit in?

The Secretary of Housing and Economic Development for Massachusetts considers the state's cultural economy "a key economic driver that needs proper attention from the administration," and is working to create a Creative Economy Council.

The premise behind promoting a "creative economy" is that a strong cultural presence improves the image of a region, and helps to attract visitors, businesses, and prospective homeowners.

A recent economic impact reports show that "every dollar spent marketing cultural tourism returns five dollars," and that "new marketing efforts have helped to generate $14.2 billion in direct spending by visitors to Massachusetts."

The CCWC's annual summer conference and educational programs are cultural assets for Cape Cod, just as the Cape's theaters, museums, and galleries are. We are upgrading our website and other marketing communications with this in mind.

As our role in the creative economy grows, we need to outgrow our space. C. H. Newton Builders has generously donated our office for several years, but we must think about being in a space in a logical partnership with another organization to improve our visibility and credibility.

Please keep all of this in mind as you participate in the Cape's cultural scene-how the Cape Cod Writers' Center might strengthen its role, and where we might live in a more visible location.

We have much to look forward to in 2008! Please join us in growing your Writers' Center.

EVENTS AND OPPORTUNITIES

All listings are meant to share information with our members and do not reflect an endorsement by CCWC. Please go to the direct source of these opportunities and events to confirm details.

The deadline of March 30, 2008 is fast approaching for a scholarship competition sponsored by Writers' Conferences & Centers. One $500 scholarship each in poetry and fiction will be awarded to attend a Writers Conference & Center member program. (CCWC is a member.) Complete rules and guidelines are available at: www.writersconf.org

Claire Cook, author of Must Love Dogs and Life's a Beach, a longtime friend of the Writers' Center, sent us news of Family Circle magazine's Fiction Writing Contest. Details of the 2008 competition are in the March issue of Family Circle, or can be found at their website, www.familycircle.com. The grand prize of $750 includes publication in Family Circle. Deadline for submissions is August 31, 2008.

The Cape Cod Theatre Project will hold its second Ten Minute Playwriting Contest this spring. Residents of the Cape and Islands are invited to submit their plays by the May 1, 2008 deadline. The top three winners will receive a cash award and the first place play will be performed at the Theatre Project Benefit on July 13. For details on submissions: www.capecodtheatreproject.org.

Information on the Nimrod Awards Competition is available from the University of Tulsa at www.utulsa.edu/nimrod. The Pablo Neruda Prize for Poetry, and the Katherine Anne Porter Prize for Fiction, offer first prizes of $2,000, second prizes of $1,000, plus publication in Nimrod International Literary Journal. Postmark deadline for submissions is April 30, 2008.

A limited number of scholarships are available to the Cape Cod Writers' Center's 46th summer conference. Scholarships cover tuition costs only, and do not cover travel, lodging or manuscript evaluations. Details will be printed in the conference booklet, to be mailed to all current members in May.

It's time for talented writers between the ages of 12 and 16 to apply for participation in Cape Cod Writers' Center's annual Young Writers' Workshop. The weeklong workshop will be held from August 18 to 22 during our summer conference, and offers sessions for writers of poetry and prose. Taught by published authors with extensive experience in teaching young people, these classes offer students a chance to improve their writing skills while enjoying the camaraderie of like-minded peers. Applications are available by contacting the CCWC. Thanks to generous donor support, the only charge is a $10.00 registration fee on acceptance. Please help spread the word about this wonderful program.
DOWNLOAD APPLICATION.

CCWC member Alice Kociemba sends news of the upcoming Calliope Poetry Readings at West Falmouth Library, 575 West Falmouth Highway (Rte. 28A) Sundays: March 30, April 27, and June 1, from 3:00 p.m. - 5:00 p.m. Open mike sign-up at 2:45 p.m. A $5.00 donation is requested. Contact Alice for further details at 508-566-1090, or e-mail: alicekociemba@verizon.net.

The Cultural Center of Cape Cod will host a poetry reading given by Alicia Ostriker, on April 3 at 7:00 p.m. Ostriker is a major American poet and critic, and author of eleven volumes of poetry, most recently No Heaven. Admission is $12 ($10 for CCWC members). Cultural Center of Cape Cod, 307 Old Main St., South Yarmouth. 508-394-7100. For more information, go to: www.cultural-center.org.

In the planning stages at the Cultural Center of Cape Cod is an open mike night on Friday, May 2, for poets who have been inspired by, or written about, jazz. This event is part of Jazz at the Cultural Center festival, May 1-4. Visit www.cultural-center.org,or call 508-394-7100 to confirm details.

Do you have news of interest to share with our members?

Recent publishing deals or promotional appearances? Please send your notices to Kathryn Basile, CCWC Business Manager writers@capecodwriterscenter.org or fax 508-420-0212. We will spread the word, as time and space allows.

The Cape Cod Writers' Center is supported in part by the Massachusetts Cultural Council

E-mail Address Updates Requested:

From time to time, an event of interest to our members comes up between newsletters, and we send out a brief e-mail notice. Writers Night Out events are exclusively publicized by e-mail due to the time frame. The savings in time, postage and paper can't be denied, so if you're willing to share your e-mail address, please do!


REFERRAL LISTS

TEACHERS

The CCWC receives requests for authors to speak or teach at libraries, councils on aging, book clubs, etc. If you are interested having your name added to the CCWC TEACHER/AUTHOR referral list, please forward a short resume and your teaching and/or publishing credits to writers@capecodwriterscenter.org

EDITORS AND AGENTS

The CCWC is working to expand the list of editors and agents who will work with CCWC members. If you work as an editor and would like us to refer writers to you, please send a resume with a cover letter to writers@capecodwriterscenter.org

If you know of an agent who you think would consider the work of CCWC members, please be in touch as well.